


The Sins of His Shadow

by tenscupcake



Category: Doctor Who (2005), Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe, Blood, Crossover, Demonic Possession, F/M, Non-Consensual Kissing, Non-Consensual Touching, Superwho, Swearing, Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-08-10
Updated: 2015-06-26
Packaged: 2018-02-12 15:11:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 5
Words: 20,726
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2114592
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tenscupcake/pseuds/tenscupcake
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When the Doctor gets possessed by a demon after their adventures with the werewolf in 1800's Scotland, a frightened and bewildered Rose bravely faces down whatever creature has taken control of his body alone, but will soon find that sometimes help comes from unexpected places.<br/>Note: This is a crossover with <em>Supernatural</em>, but it is primarily a Doctor/Rose story.<br/>WARNING: This story carries a <b>non-con/dub-con</b> warning, but does <em>not</em> contain rape. This warning applies <em>multiple chapters.</em> If you'd like more information, please message me on Tumblr and I'll respond privately.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've been dying to write this prompt for months and was suddenly overwhelmed with plot bunnies in the shower the other night and finally wrote many of them down. This is _much_ darker than I normally go, but you can be reassured in the fact that I'll promise a happy ending (I would need that reassurance if I were you). ~~I cannot believe I am working on two multi-chaps now don't even look at me I'm sorry.~~

Rose had seen her fair share of the strange and inexplicable creatures traveling with the Doctor. From exotic to downright bizarre, unattractive to positively hideous, slightly creepy to utterly terrifying. One thing she never thought she’s see though, was anything to lend credence to mythical legends of the scary books and Halloween costumes from her childhood. But today, she couldn’t help feeling a bit overwhelmed by their accidental excursion to nineteenth century Scotland, because they’d found something there that was more than just extraterrestrial – it was paranormal.

It’d been exciting at first, running from a giant wolf that she’d watched transform from a man with her own eyes, because the Doctor could make almost anything a rush of adrenaline, trample down the fears with only his presence. But as she thought about it after the fact, the memory of innocent people becoming victims of its bloodlust and the very real possibility that the Queen had been bitten tainted the rush of exhilarating events with nagging, ominous fears in the back of her mind. That maybe the universe was even bigger than she’d thought, that they shared it with not only aliens from far-off galaxies, but with other nightmarish creatures she thought were confined to the horror films they thrived in.

She squashed down the fears easily as they walked back to the TARDIS, vivid green grass crunching under their feet and a bright blue sky scattered with puffy clouds above them, fresh, unpolluted air filling her lungs. With the Doctor by her side, she knew she’d be able to handle anything. And so, she joked with him about the royal family being werewolves, ready to leave the haunting memories of the castle’s furry, howling guest behind them. What she never guessed is that they were being targeted, pursued by the supernatural, and the wolf was only the beginning.

\---

Something happens once they’re in the confines of the TARDIS, a rapid transformation in the Doctor’s expression, his mannerisms. Innocent flirtations and gentle smiles give way to a mischievous smirk, undisguised, arrogant charisma as he turns on her once the doors close behind them.

“Have I told you how _beautiful_ you are lately?” he purrs, lingering on the word ‘beautiful’ like he’s tasting each letter on his tongue.

“Uhm…” His question’s caught her off guard, sure, but it’s the way he saunters over to where she waits for him by the console, hips swaying, shoulders back like suddenly he’s confident with all zero pounds of muscle he’s got on his slim frame. The way he dances out of his coat and tosses it on one of the corals like he’s performing a strip tease. The way his eyes lock onto hers with self-assurance he’s never had and suddenly she’s a bird caught in the eyes of a snake.

“No,” she finishes her earlier, unformed thought as she takes a step back from his advance, subconsciously favoring the rhythmic humming of the console that’s always brought her peace. “Can’t say y’have.”

“Well.” His voice drops lower, thickening with something she can’t place her finger on. “I should tell you more often.” His eyes rake a slow path from her eyes to her toes and back again, lingering twice on her breasts and too long on the hem of her jean skirt, and as he hums deeply with satisfaction and it makes her toes curl even in her too-tight shoes. And as he steps closer, she finds her feet shuffling back again, wary of the unfamiliar forwardness but thrilled enough by it that she stays willingly trapped in his hungry gaze.

His eyes close as he inhales a deep breath through his nose, groaning softly as he expels the air from his lungs from his mouth.

“Blimey, you smell… These senses are so much…” _What?_ She backs away again, confused by his words, but the backs of her thighs bump into the console and she’s out of space. “Incredible.”

“Doctor, I told you, I don’t – ” She shifts her feet, turning away from him again as his hands vacate his pockets and reach out for her. “ I don’t like it when you, y’know, smell me, and… that sort of thing.” She’s nearly stumbling back towards the jumpseat as she strives to sound casual, a hand on the console for stability, but his gait only mirrors hers, slowly chasing her around the half-circle, a lion crouching through the grass, eyes only for the wildebeest that she’s become.

“I’m sorry.” He raises his hands and for a moment he sounds like the Doctor again; apologies and accepting culpability have always been his forte.

And so as she backs unwittingly against the jumpseat and his shoes skid to a halt, toes sliding forward to touch hers, she relaxes a little but not enough to trust what he’s doing. She keeps her eyes fixed on his jacket, the open buttons of the polo underneath, the rare undershirt and the even rarer lack of a tie, and as it turns out analyzing his daily wardrobe choices calms her immeasurably. She knows these pinstripes, even after scarcely a month knows their coarse, starchy texture and has one too many times admired the way they almost cling to his skin.

Cautiously, her gaze ascends, over the smooth expanse of his neck, the soft lines of his jaw, his mouth lingering open just enough that his bottom lip tempts her, full and pink and enticing her to confirm whether it’s as delectable as it looks. Her eyes stay there for a moment, and like he can read her thoughts, his tongue swipes deliciously between his lips, a tease of darker pink teasing her further until it retreats quickly as it came, leaving nothing but a light glisten on his lips and a knot twisting deep in her gut.

He’s waiting for her, quietly inhaling deep breaths and she knows he’s picking up whatever scents are lost to her senses, because she hadn’t even bothered with perfume or sprays this morning. That signature scent of his is light on the air, a little stronger on his exhaled breaths, a hint of mint, like a pine forest in the winter, that she’s never had the courage to ask is a Time Lord thing or just a Doctor thing.

Finally her eyes lift enough to meet his, pupils blown wide with desire, only rims of the chocolaty brown she knows around the edges, and they instantly zero in on hers. Her breath catches in her throat and that’s somewhat normal, but there’s something more than excitement and attraction in her quiet gasp now: there’s fear, real, tangible fear. And she has no idea why, because while she’s confused and bewildered she shouldn’t be afraid – this is the Doctor, after all, a man she trusts more than anyone.

With a subtle smirk, he tests her, determines if she’s comfortable or not, and she doesn’t know why but she smirks back though she’s not comfortable, she’s thrilled at the sudden possibilities but terrified by the abrupt change in his demeanor. Desperate to crush her lips to his but nervous something’s happened to him to inspire this sudden penchant for seduction, in an alien who’s up to this point been painfully awkward at any mentions of romance or indications of beyond-platonic behavior. Who was both useless and palpably uncomfortable the obligatory conversation that followed their first, not-so-proper kiss when she was possessed by Cassandra.

Not allowing her more time to consider her options, he’s bringing his mouth to hers, hands grabbing her waist. His kiss is urgent and sloppy, his body language dominant, fingers gripping tightly to hold her fast as she squirms out of mostly shock. It’s not how she imagined it in her many daydreams on the subject: his mouth rough and insistent on hers, tongue fighting its way into her mouth while he has her trapped between his body and a hard surface. It’s purely human instinct, she thinks, that makes her hands fly up to his chest and push hard because she hadn’t a spare thought to think of stopping him when all she’s thought about since he regenerated is what this kiss would feel like. But her hands are right and soon her brain catches up; something’s off and she needs to find out what it is before they go any further.

“Doctor, what’s gotten into you?” she asks, trying not to sound breathless and swiftly failing.

“What do you mean?” His response is frustrated and impatient and she has to feel a little guilty for denying his advance, when she’s waited so long for it.

“I – I don’t – ” She isn’t sure how to explain her hesitance.

“Rose, it’s me. It’s the Doctor. Haven’t you always wanted this?” It’s a strange question, coming from him. If he’s always known, how come he never made a move before, why now, and why alter his personality in his attempts to entice her? Besides, his burst of haughty self-assurance is questionable and out of the ordinary as ever. But he’s right, on all accounts, he _is_ the Doctor and she _has_ always wanted this. Her hands still rest on his chest and she can feel a heart beating beneath both her palms, the quartet of thumps skipping faster than usual with his current state of mind.

“See?” he says, catching the placement of her hands.

“Yeah,” she agrees reluctantly, meeting his eyes again. They soften and just a little more brown comes into view and it’s reassurance she needs. With a gentle, almost shy smile, he says more than any choice of words could, and she’s at the mercy of his whims again and oh, he knows it.

She hardly has time to return the grin before he’s kissing her again, and it’s just as forceful and messy but she’s nearly accepted it this time. Time Lords are a powerful race and she assumes this is how he needs to be, demonstrating power in acts of passion might be innate, customary for him. Returning his enthusiasm, losing herself in his touch for a time, she relishes the taste of him under her tongue, unraveling the paradox that lips as tender and as silky as she imagined are so harsh and possessive as they move against hers.

One of his hands is on her chin in a flash, his thumb on her cheek coaxing her lips to part further and she surrenders to his tongue, the slick tip rushing between her lips, the rough texture of the flat of his tongue conquering the expanse of her mouth. Giving in further, her hands tangle through his hair, fingernails scraping his scalp, almost tugging on the soft, thick strands as her fingers course through it and it’s marvelous as it tickles her skin but it only makes him more insatiable.

With a deep growl, his mouth separates from hers as he scoops her off the metal floor with one hand under her thigh, setting her on the jumpseat as easily as if she weighed ten ounces. She didn’t recall him being quite so strong and another surge of excitement spreads through her veins, warm and electrifying because damn it she’s always wanted this, always been head-over-heels desperate for him.

His mouth is on her neck as he steps between her legs, and one hand’s on the small of her back to pull her flush against him and the other lands near her knee, thumb circling over sensitive flesh until she’s shivering even through the black nylon. His tongue swirls over her skin at her pulse point, he trails more searing, wet kisses down her throat and across her collarbone. His lips are at the crook of her shoulder and his teeth scrape at her skin in his frightening desperation, and he sucks at her skin and she groans at the sudden pleasure.

But he’s encouraged too strongly, moving back up her neck towards her ear he’s rougher until she feels his teeth sinking into her delicate skin with each new spot he picks to leave a bruised mark, and she cries out again but this time it’s because it’s too much. She tries calling out his name to get his attention but it’s misinterpreted as an outburst of enjoyment, of ecstasy, and he doesn’t stop.

The hand on her knee starts to slide its way up her thigh, fingertips just grazing her skin through the thin, airy fabric as his palm makes its way between her legs. That feeling returns, the unbridled, inexplicable fear that this isn’t the Doctor, after all. Her hands abandon his now wildly mussed up hair and she pushes his chest again, remembering it worked only minutes before.

A feral snarl assaults her ears as his lips and teeth and tongue desert her neck at once, his arm tightening around her back, fingers digging into her overalls insistently. His dark eyes capture hers for a short moment as he lifts his head, and the sickening fear in her stomach mounts because there’s suddenly so much missing from his gaze. The wisdom signature of the Doctor, the endless depths of time contained in them, and the hidden realms of pain are all but absent in the brown pools of his irises, and she’s suddenly certain again he’s not the Doctor. But then his lips are crashing down on hers again, silencing any pleas she might try to make while his hand travels further up the inside of her thigh until it’s slipping under her skirt.

Mustering every last bit of strength from the depths of her core, she makes two snap decisions: biting down on his lip hard and punching him in the stomach with both fists. In the back of her mind she prays that there won’t be any damage to the proper Doctor when, or if, he returns to her, but something’s terribly wrong and she’s got no choice.

It works. His hands back away as his knees buckle slightly from the blow to his gut, and his mouth separates from hers with another angry growl. The animalistic sound effects from his throat make her question whether he was bitten by the wolf apart from her knowledge and she shudders at the thought even through the rush of survival-promoting hormones.

“Argh,” he grunts out, licking his bleeding lip with a dangerous scowl but his hips don’t move from between her legs. She seizes the vulnerable moment and slaps him hard across the cheek, her palm stinging from the impact and God, she hopes this isn’t the Doctor because she’s scared to death and never thought she’d be smacking him, especially not for assault. But it’s as he’s backing away, hands finally retreating from her body, as she watches his face in anticipation of a strong reaction, that the truth is revealed in his eyes.

The black of his pupils liquefies and spreads, instantly covering over his irises and even the white sclera of his eyes until there’s nothing but dark ebony between his eyelids, reflecting the dim green light of the console like polished paint. He blinks a handful of times like he’s getting accustomed to the feeling, eyelashes invisible against his now purely black eyes. Plastering on a devilish grin, he drops every semblance of his earlier delicate façade, and her pulse races as she faces down him down, the monster, perhaps even the killer that’s taken the Doctor’s face.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Muahahaha. I love when I can work on this one. demon!Doctor is deliciously fun to write. Enjoy!  
> NON-CON WARNING STILL APPLIES. MILD VIOLENCE!

“Feisty,” he speaks finally with a chilling grin as he wipes a drop of blood from his chin with the back of his hand. “I like that.” He raises his eyebrows, smile widening as if to impart playfulness to the comment, like he’s enjoying the pain and seeping red as much as the events that led up to it.

“Who are you?” She tries for an intimidating shout but her vocal cords betray her and it winds up as a frightened squeak, palms groping frantically around the jumpseat for a weapon as her feet shuffle blindly backwards around it. When he encroaches on her again, one long, lean stride to negate several of her clumsy steps, she musters up her courage and yells more properly.

“You _don’t_ touch me! Stay back!” Thrusting her index finger towards him and focusing on producing her most menacing glare, she takes another step back towards the hall, longer and more deliberate. He raises his arms into the air as though in surrender, but waves a hand to dismiss her accusations as he laughs, a bitter sound that has her spine tingling and feet slowly going numb.

“Listen, princess, a fuck would’ve been nice, but I’m not gonna fight you for it.” It’s then she notices he’s speaking with a thick Scottish accent, not unlike the one the proper Doctor had fabricated the morning before. He shrugs innocently but the gesture is ruined by face, eyes still black as charcoal, furrowed brow darkening and something sinister in his smile tarnishing the Doctor’s mouth. “Too much effort.” His hands find his pockets, then, and he doesn’t move, instead scanning slowly around himself, eyes roaming over bits of the console, the jumpseat, and the grating, but rhythmically finding their way back to her. Ensuring she doesn’t escape or enjoying the view, she isn’t sure. And she has no idea whether she believes he doesn’t have the motivation to take further advantage of her before she can get away, or if he’ll change his mind soon, if he does mean it.

“Where’s the Doctor? What’ve you done to him!?” She raises her voice again, surprised at the volume and authority contained in the words as she continues to take slow steps backward.

“Haven’t done anything to him, technically. Not yet,” he says casually, tilting his head side to side a few times as she hears his neck crack several times.

“Wha’d’you mean?” she cries, and it’s begging for as much as demanding an answer, the power in her voice slipping by the second as her fear escalates. “Where is he!?” she amps up the volume hoping it can disguise her fright.

“Ohhh, he’s in here somewhere.” One hand abandons his pocket to tap a finger lightly against his skull a couple times.

“Doctor, are you in there!? Can ya hear me!?” she yells, all her anxiety in her face as her guard drops for a moment – if there’s any chance he can hear or see her she has to at least try, even if it’s a vain attempt. Maybe there’s a chance he can snap out of this, shake it off, like he always does.

“Sorry, the Doctor’s not available at the moment. I’m controlling this meat suit for the time being.” His name rolls of his tongue with an ‘r’ sound, and all his vowels sound different and she quickly clamps a hand over her mouth to block her whimper from escaping, because that sickening fear in her gut is being realized. It isn’t some knock-off, an impostor or a clone: if this _thing_ is telling the truth, he’s hi-jacked the Doctor’s body altogether, like Cassandra had done to her on their last misadventure.

“Give him back to me!” she shouts as a traitorous tear escapes from her eyes, blurring her view with moisture, and she shucks a finger at him with a now violently shaking arm.

“Or what?” he retorts with another shrug and a sadistic chuckle.

“Or I’ll… we’ve got weapons on here,” she lies. The Doctor has nothing of the sort – the only object remotely resembling a weapon is tucked away in the inside pocket of his suit jacket, like always, and she’s not going to let him in on that.

“Oh,” he laughs heartily. “What’re you gonna do, kill me?”

“I - I – ” she stutters, unsure of how to escape from the trap he’s setting for her, to avoid exposing her own helplessness and utter lack of a plan.

“Who’re you kidding, princess? You aren’t gonna kill _the Doctor_ , you’re infatuated with him.”  He puts both hands over the Doctor’s hearts in a mocking gesture and shakes his head, unrelenting grin still sending shivers down her spine as the truth sinks in. She can’t hurt him, not when she risks hurting the Doctor, too. If there’s the slightest possibility he can feel it, whatever’s happening to the monster, she won’t do it. And she thinks that’s likely, given she could feel everything Cassandra did.

“The Doctor can regenerate!” she argues, grasping at straws for any substantial threat she can shout out while setting her jaw to prevent her teeth from chattering. She doesn’t step back, though, not anymore, gaining courage with her fabricated plans to plant her feet on the grating just before the hall.

“You sure about that?” he asks, raising one eyebrow with an arrogant smirk that chips away any faux arrogance she might have mustered . She isn’t sure, not completely. What if this thing can stop him from regenerating? Not that she’d even consider killing the Doctor – it was a bluff and he’s already calling it.

“Go on, then,” he threatens. “What’re you gonna use, hm? Can you really drive a knife into this chest, watch his blood seep through the clothes, watch him writhe in pain and crumple to the ground? That is, assuming it would kill me, first?” There’s a concoction of ferocity and humor in his expression and her stomach twists and her heart clenches with the images he’s conjured – she already knew it would never happen in a million lifetimes. Her eyes sting and her throat aches as she shakes off the pervasive thoughts and lets out a huff of furious, exasperated breath that this monster has this power over her. Power he doesn’t deserve.

“Let ‘im go!” she demands, out of other threatening ideas.

“Or _what_?” the throws back again, winning the battle for dominance easily.

“I can still hurt you, you… bastard!”

“Aye.” He nods, teeth gleaming green in the light of the console. “But will you?” Two steps closer and he’s close enough she could sock him again, if she had the courage. “You think he can’t feel pain?” he asks, voice low and smooth and terrifying as he leans in, like he’s daring her to do it.

“You won’t lay a finger on this body,” he adds, the words flowing from his tongue like a hushed serenade but his dark eyes and the set of his jaw makes it a command, though it’s simply a statement of fact. He’s right: she won’t. Her feet are rooted to the spot as he approaches, arms frozen at her sides in terror as his pitch-black eyes lock onto hers and cage her in their glare, enforcing authority she has no choice but to yield to him.

“You know what else?” His hand shoots out and manacles her wrist before she can even see him move.

“Let me go!” she squeals, squirming and pulling back with all her weight, but his hold on her doesn’t slacken; his grip is unrelenting as metal, a handcuff closing in harder until she feels the impact down to the bone, breaking blood vessels on her skin. She cries out when he tugs her back towards him and his other hand lands on her neck, fingers digging into the top of her spine and pressing more fingertip-shaped bruises into her skin. After only seconds she cringes from the effort of trying to pull away and gives up, relaxing her stance and shuddering under his harsh touch, waiting for it to be over, whatever he’s about to do.

“The only reason I kept you alive,” he murmurs, silken tones laced with malice. His face hovers just a few inches from hers, making her breathing erratic and sending her heart crashing against her ribcage so hard she can feel her chest throbbing from the impact. “Is because you are very beautiful…” he glances down her body and she wishes she could sink into the floor and end the ogling this instant. “And you smell…” Inhaling deeply again, his black eyes closing in delight at whatever scent is undetectable to her nose as he leans into her neck, relishing it. “Delectable,” he moans on the exhale.

“But it was silly of me to think…” he almost continues, breath blazing hot on her neck, but then his mouth closes around a sensitive spot on her skin with a deep sigh, sending the wrong kind of shivers down her spine and making her whimper again. She holds still because she can’t get away, not when he’s still got an iron grip in two spots on her body and just lets him do it. “I could seduce you if you thought I was the Doctor, because apparently,” he purrs, and his teeth close over her skin this time, possessive and anything but gentle and she bites her lip to keep from crying out again. “You don’t put out for him, either.” His head pulls away and he rights himself, the tingling pain from where he tasted her still sending gooseflesh down her arms, still painfully tensed with anticipation.

“So tell me why I shouldn’t just kill you,” he commands fiercely, instantly dropping the suave façade once again and tightening his hold on her neck further. “Hm?” he raises his voice when she doesn’t answer and she struggles for a single syllable to defend her continued existence, but something happens to him before she can panic.

“Aghhh!” he gasps, wincing in pain, his grip on her loosening substantially. Whatever struck him seems to subside and he stares at her, bewildered and confused. “What?” he asks, clear and quiet but he’s quickly racked with another round of the torture and he yells again, dropping his hands from her and clutching at his head as his eyes squeeze shut. “No!” he manages to shout through his episode of pain or whatever it is that’s happening.

Suddenly he stops his twisting about, his back straightens and his hands drop from his head, and his shrieking is replaced with labored breathing that’s almost hyperventilating, fraught with panic. But he opens his eyes and they’re no longer black – the whites of his eyes have returned and the Doctor’s brown irises are staring into hers.

“Rose, I don’t – ” He can hardly speak for all his heavy gasping and he puts an arm over his stomach to catch his breath for a few seconds. “I don’t know what’s happening I – ” She thought for certain it was another ruse, a joke to play further with her emotions, but he’s beyond distressed and she realizes now that his English accent has returned (and further realizes the demon hadn’t done the best job imitating it earlier and kicks herself for not noticing) and she’s wasting whatever time they might have.

“Doctor!?” she yells, racing the few steps between them to try to comfort him.

“Stay back!” he commands, holding out a firm hand to keep her from touching him.

“Doctor, what’s happenin’?!” she demands, dread rising in her chest as she watches him struggle with some inner pain and to inhale enough oxygen.

“Run! I can’t hold him – gahh!” He sinks to his knees as his eyes wrench shut in pain and she realizes – the Doctor’s broken through but it’s only temporary. She calls his name again but just stands helpless.

“Rose, please – run! Don’t – want him to hurt you!” His warning is punctuated with grimaces and groans that make her fists clench and her chest throb.

“’M not leavin’ you!” she says, resolute, because she doesn’t want to find out what will happen if she leaves him alone. He grunts and she knows he’s frustrated and hates it when she doesn’t listen to his advice for her own safety but he can’t do anything about it, not in this state. With a trembling arm he reaches into his suit and pulls out the sonic, holding it out for her as his face twists in pain again.

“Take it!” he yells. “Setting – argh! – 213! Rose, I’m sorry, I’m so… so…” he trails off in favor of panting his final breaths as his eyes pool with black again, his pained and guilty expression replaced with the other man’s evil, smirking arrogance.

“Fuck, his mind’s stronger than I thought.” He gets quickly to his feet, shakes out a few twitches in his limbs, and rolls his shoulders back as he becomes reacquainted with his stolen body. “Human’s never managed that with me before.” She’s not having any of his patronizing rambling on this time.

“Who the hell are you?” she orders, having flicked the sonic to the setting the Doctor told her while he was in a moment of weakness, pointing the stick of metal towards him and fashioning her best menacing scowl.

“And just what’re you gonna do with that torch, eh?” He chuckles darkly. Refusing to tolerate any snark, she mashes her thumb on the button, praying fiercely that whatever it’s going to do won’t harm the Doctor, wherever he is in there. Gnashing his teeth together, he hisses loudly as he grabs at his head again, clearly affected by whatever supersonic radiation was coming from the seemingly innocuous blue light and mild whirring.

“Stop,” he snaps, and she listens, taking pressure off the button and waiting to ensure he’s not making a predatory move.

“Who are you?” she repeats, seething.

“Name’s Peter. Lucifer’s fifth in command, at your service.” He gestures to himself like he’s proud of the title, but her stomach drops at the biblical reference.

“Lucifer?” she echoes him in barely a whisper. “Y’can’t mean… like…”

“The archangel.”

“The devil?”

“That’s a made-up title. Doesn’t go by that name where I’m from.”

“Where are you from, then?” she asks, voice shakier than she intended.

“Hell,” he asks, glaring at her with a mixture of sass and confusion like she’s the dumbest thing he’s ever met.

“Hell? So you’re not… are you… I mean…”

“A demon,” he claims, cutting her off before she can ask the question on the tip of her tongue. “So you really don’t want to fuck with me, sweetheart.” His hardly submissive attitude dissolves into a murderous glare as he re-asserts control, shaking his head to admonish against further questions about his origin. Suddenly he darts forward, aiming to take the sonic from her hand but she stumbles back, flinging her arm about in an attempt to shake him. His hands are palming her arms and her breasts in his fight for the device and manages to tear her shirt until she finally wriggles her hand enough to turn it on and, thankfully, it’s aimed at him.

She bolts off running as soon as his hands abandon their mission, and he’s groaning and complaining as she stumbles down the hall, holding the sonic behind her. Soon she can’t seem to run fast enough with her hand twisted around and she shuts it off, pushing off stronger with her legs and looking left and right frantically for the first door. The utter absence of the sound of footsteps pounding down the hall behind her is lost to her frenzied mind, as she considers a door must be getting close she chances a glance back. Seeing only the curving hallway and no pursuer, she faces forward again and slows her pace slightly, only to find herself running straight towards the minion of hell, standing stoic and unmoving not ten feet in front of her.

Skidding to a halt with help from her shoes and her hands sliding along on the wall to her right, she can’t help but let out a desperate curse as she flicks the sonic back on and aims it behind her. Trying her hardest to stay calm, she sends a mental plea to the TARDIS for help, to move one of the doors or do something to help her flee from him. No sooner does she ask does she see the deep red door to her room appear only a few running paces away. She almost feels relieved, but not-the-Doctor materializes into view in the middle of the hall before she can get there, blocking the door. Bloody hell, he can teleport.

Wheeling on her heels again, she finds another door has appeared opposite where she stands, and she hurls her body into the wood, clutching at the handle until it swings open under her weight. Stumbling into the room, she spins around and slams it behind her, begging the TARDIS to lock it because she has no clue how to set the sonic to do it. She must have obeyed though, because the next second she hears an unsuccessful jiggling of the handle followed by angry growls and grunts as the demon slams what sounds like his entire body into the door time and time again.

She only has a moment to worry about the Doctor having bruises and broken bones from the impact before she remembers the demon’s strength, and knows given another minute he’ll break down the door. On turning around she finds herself in the kitchen, and breathes a sigh of relief as she darts to the pantry, shoving aside a misplaced chair along the way. Relocating a few boxes of Frosted Flakes, she presses her hand to the exact spot on the whitewashed wall that the Doctor showed her on her second week aboard, one of many stops on his extensive walkthrough tour of all the TARDIS’ amenities and safety features.

A thin line lights up green around her hand and the middle of the floor buckles and falls open with a loud creaking sound, and she rolls her eyes that with all the advanced technology available through time and space they couldn’t have a more discreet secret passage. Still hearing rhythmic pounding on the door, she sits down at the edge, hangs her feet over and braces herself, because she remembers it being a far drop. She jumps from the ledge and lands with a thud, and the hatch above her seals itself off instantly, cloaking the hall in complete darkness.

“Little light’d be nice,” she complains, thick with attitude the TARDIS doesn’t deserve. Bright orange lights flicker to life down the expanse of blue walls and wooden floor, various types of pipes and wires not a foot overhead.

“Sorry,” she says immediately. It’s not the ship’s fault that the Doctor is possessed by a demon, that he might be trying to kill her, and may have some sinister purpose for taking his body in the first place. A powerful body inside one of the most powerful ships in the universe, and there’s a bloody demon controlling it.

“Look, I need to get to my room, my phone’s in there. I need to call for help,” she pleads. She rubs at her eyes, surprised to find tears spilling over the edges, and quickly smears them away with the back of her hand. Her teeth have started chattering now that she can let go of her bottled emotions, and her legs are wobbling beneath her with each step so she doesn’t bother running down the corridor, even when she sees the door to her room has appeared at the opposite end. Now’s not the time for self-pity; the Doctor’s in mortal danger and there’s an evil maniac loose aboard the TARDIS, and she has to somehow fix both before he’s lost forever.

She finally makes her way into her room, and it’s the same as she left it before Scotland – the quilt a mess, her pajamas on the carpet where she’d thrown them off... her phone on the armoire. Signaling the TARDIS to return her room to its rightful place, she locks the door behind her (it’s a manual but still guaranteed secure lock on her door) and dashes to her phone, flipping it open and immediately scrolling through her contacts to Mickey. He’s the only one who would ever believe this cocked-up tale and he’s always helpful, if not a bit jealous and immature.

He picks up on the second ring.

“Rose?” She can’t stop from bursting into tears at the sound of her name, having held them back for too long.

“Rose, what’s the matter, babe?” he coos, unaware of the gravity of her situation.

“It’s the Doctor, he’s – ” She can’t quite tell the story while trying to suppress her sobs, and Mickey’s gentleness transforms to alarm at her state.

“What happened? Did he hurt you?” he asks, protective as an older brother.

“No, no, it’s not… he’s…” She takes a few deep breaths, calming the shaking of her limbs and the trembling of her lungs. “There’s a demon – inside him. He’s – been possessed or – something,” she explains through noisy sniffs and gasps for breath.

“A demon? What’re you on about!?” he shouts back.

“Mickey, ‘m not – kiddin’ I – I dunno – what to do. I’m so – scared.”

“Are you sure it’s a demon?”

“Well, he – told me he was.”

“Are you away from him now? Are you safe?”

“Yeah.”

“Ok. Listen, get a tissue, take a few deep breaths, sit down.” With a quick trip to the loo for some tissues and Mickey talking her through breathing normally as she sits down on the bed, she finally calms enough to talk normally.

“Right, now start from the beginnin’, tell me what happened.” Striving to maintain control of her voice, she recounts the events of the last fifteen minutes, emphasizing the demon’s black eyes, paranormal strength, and threats on her life, and only reluctantly admitting the brush with assault when prompted whether he touched her.

“Where are you?” he asks, which frankly is the least of her current concerns.

“In Scotland, about 150 years before your time. This happened before we got the chance to leave.” A string of muffled curses sounds from the line and then there’s a long pause that she can only hear him breathing heavily.

“Rose, this is way over my head,” he admits finally. “I’m gonna try to help but I – ” He coughs, and Rose knows it’s a curtain drawn to hide how he’s becoming upset. “I’m gonna get to my computer.”

“Yeah, Mickey, that’s great. Perfect. Anything you can find.” Several moments of rustling and banging around pass before he speaks again.

“If he’s possessed by a demon, we just need to exorcise the demon, right? Everything’ll be fine as long as we get it out.”

“I dunno.” She sighs, rubbing her eyes as her head droops into her free hand. “No idea how to exorcise demons, d’you?”

“No. But that’s what I’m about to find out,” he says confidently, ignoring her attitude, typical Mickey. “I’m gonna put you on speaker.”

After a few minutes of his typing accompanied by a narration of his search parameters, he clicks on hit after hit of religious websites and extremist blogs, reads off one ridiculous theory after another for how to exorcise an evil spirit. Her room isn’t stocked with a priest or a crucifix and she certainly doesn’t know any Bible verses, and before he can try to read off a manuscript from the film _The Exorcist_ , she cuts him off.

“I’m not gonna go readin’ off some line from a movie, Mickey, this isn’t a joke!”

“I’m just tryin’ to help!” he retorts and she instantly regrets snapping at him. But listening to him try to navigate the Internet while she sits unable to see the images on the screen and without the freedom to type in the searches herself isn’t something she can handle in a fit of anxiety. For a fleeting, guilty moment, she wishes she had Captain Jack’s number – she’s sure he’d know what to do.

“Look, ‘m sorry, just… this isn’t working. I need a more reliable source. Look, ‘m gonna try to get to the library – the Doctor’s got to have something about demons hidden in there somewhere. I’ll call you back, yeah?”

“Alright, yeah. I’m gonna keep looking while you do. Wait, wait! Rose, is it safe? To get to the library I mean? Is he still out there?”

“I dunno where he is. Last I knew he was breakin’ into the kitchen.” She sighs, thinking of the volume of knives and other sharp objects contained in that room. “I think I’m safe. I think the TARDIS can help me lose track of him while I’m in the hallway.” She clings to that fervent hope as she straightens her shoulders and walks to the door, determination fueling her muscles. “Call you later,” she whispers, hardly waiting for him to respond before ending the call and shoving her phone into her pocket.

 _Please let the library be close, please let the library be close…_ The chant repeats endlessly in her mind as she turns the handle on her door, thankful that the doors are at least one thing that doesn’t squeak and creak in the ancient ship.

Opening the door just enough to poke her head into the hall, she takes a quick survey of the dimly green, quiet hall that seems to extend infinitely in both directions, the usual slightly chilly air permeating the few inches between the door and the frame. The narrow walkways are clear, not a figure or a shadow in sight, and to her delight the door to the library only a few paces to her left across the hall.

Closing her eyes for a moment, she allows herself time to count to three before she squeezes through the doorway, shuts it behind her, and breaks into as much of a sprint as possible on her tiptoes to the opposite door, bursting through and closing it with her weight resting on it. She only realizes she hadn’t taken a breath when she’s gasping to catch her breath as she turns to the myriad books behind her.

“Hide me from ‘im, yeah?” she whispers to the TARDIS as she meanders over to the shelves, scanning for anything related to religion or even remotely paranormal.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this took me so long! I have too many WIPs on my plate. Hope you guys enjoy this installment - I'm certainly enjoying writing it! :]  
> KEEP IN MIND: Threats of violence, blood, swearing.

“Holy water, holy water, holy water…” Rose repeats the whisper to herself as she paces about the library. It was the only constant she could find in the paltry three texts she could find about anything that mentioned demons even tangentially. That, and the books were practically sealed shut: she’s confident the Doctor has never actually opened let alone read them.

The section where she knows the few copies of the Bible are stored lingers only a few short staircases away, and she meanders down there before long, hoping there might be a clue on how to make the mystery purity water contained in one of them. All of time and space at his disposal, and he can’t have a single, inclusive compendium on how to tackle demons in his gigantic library? She rolls her eyes to herself to prevent more hot tears from escaping their precarious containment.

There are five different recipes, thankfully all of which only involve a rosary and saying a few words over a small volume of water. Somehow, there’s a rosary somewhere in the Doctor’s fifteen hundred storage rooms, and plenty of clean water in the kitchen, and to Rose’s intense relief the TARDIS supplies them without her needing to leave the confines of the library.

She uses all five enchantments on the water, tossing in the rosary and talking nonsense in Latin and Greek and Arabic over a wooden bowl until she’s said them all. If even one of them works, it’ll be worth it: the hours pilfering through dreadfully boring religion texts without proper food or a Time Lord to snuggle up with as he read them to her.

She pours the contents of the bowl into five empty water bottles and pokes a hole in the tops with a thumbtack from the Doctor’s nearest desk, and feels more than a little ridiculous. Armed with nothing but an arsenal of plastic bottles with tiny nozzles, she’s about to walk out of here and face down a thoroughly evil, basically undead creature on her own. What will the water do to him – kill him? Exorcise him? Injure or maim? She vehemently hopes for the second option but is going into this completely blind.

Confidence is still her strong suit though, and she knows her plan would be the only thing the Doctor would endorse, free of purely offensive violence, instead opting for the pragmatic option. She’s going to talk her way into winning this thing, with the water as merely a defense mechanism, a precaution. It’s the way the Doctor’s always gone about things and she wouldn’t dream of saving him with a scheme sacrilege to his name. Having rehearsed the sentences for her arguments a thousand times, she knows exactly what to say, and, conservatively, she’s 70% sure one of them is going to work.

“Where is he?” She lingers at the door, awaiting intel.

With a simple image rather than any words, the TARDIS relays his whereabouts instantly, like she’s already been keeping an eye on him, and she’s more than a little worried he’s wreaking some sort of havoc that’s demanded she pay him constant, close attention.

“Lock this behind me,” she whispers, realizing it’s unnecessary too late, before twisting the handle and stepping into the hall, three bottles stuffed awkwardly in her overalls and one in each hand as soon as the door’s shut behind her.

The hallway is quiet save for the distant echoing of the engines, and a glance in both directions confirms he isn’t waiting for her in the immediate vicinity. With a deep breath as silent as she can manage, she heads towards the console, keeping her footsteps light, shifting her weight toe-heel rather than heel-toe and silently cursing for not changing out of the heavy shoes before leaving her room.

“Bloody _fucking_ ship!” The demon’s voice rings out, thick with rage, echoes of the words on the Doctor’s tongue sending gooseflesh down her arms. A lever’s thrown, something knocks hard into the console, and she’s thrown into the wall to her left as the TARDIS lurches and groans with a tenor and fury she’s never heard before.

Rubbing the instantaneous bruise out of her shoulder and shaking out a mildly twisted ankle, she finishes the rest of the hall at as much a run as she can manage with the searing pain, fearing for the ship’s and her own safety should he push the wrong button and turn them both into collateral damage of a time-shipwreck.

“Oi, you! Stop it!” Both her hands are in the fighting position – a bottle clenched in each set of sweaty fingers, aimed at the too-rapidly approaching streak of brown.

They squeeze too soon, spewing an unsteady stream of water from their caps in unison, but she aims them as best she can to his face and he walks directly into them. A horrific scream pierces the air as the water hits him, steam sizzling and streaming off his face where it’s making contact like his skin is a frying pan, instantly boiling any water to touch its surface. She pauses for a split second, her heart breaking at the sight of the Doctor’s misery and the cry of agony coming from his throat – she’s never seen him in so much pain and it nearly breaks her. But it can’t be him it’s hurting, can it? If it’s hurting him at all, it must be the demon, not the Doctor. So she continues her watery assault.

His hands fly up to protect himself as he stumbles back, halting his approach swiftly and she’s instantly proud, instantly more confident, hands less shaky and knees less wobbly as she follows him back, never slowing the spray until she’s backed him into the console. It’s only when he pleads with her to stop with a pathetic moan, cowering under the plastic bottles, that she speaks.

“I stop, and _I_ do the talkin’, y’got it? You don’t even move, ya hear me!”

“Yes, okay, all right!” He agrees and she releases her clenched fists from around the bottles.

It’s still burning his skin even when the water stops hitting his face, clouds of white steam billowing like a pot of tea and skin beat red and blistering from the attack, and the thought again crosses her mind that the Doctor may be feeling all this. Are they real, physical burns, or something purely mental, ethereal… only affecting the demon’s essence, rather than the Doctor’s body? She worries it’s the former. Still grunting and hissing as the last of the steam evaporates, he breathes heavily and makes no attempt to speak further or to move from his spot slumped on the floor beside the console.

“You’re tryin’ to get somewhere, yeah? You must’ve picked the Doctor for a reason. You were tryin’ to get the TARDIS to fly. Where were you tryin’ t’go?”

Rather than respond, he only scowls, ebony eyes threatening to murder her beneath the deep creases in his forehead, teeth clenched, chest still heaving with pain. But his skin is already changing back to his natural color, the red slowly lightening to dark pink, the blisters disintegrating.

“Well, out with it, then!” She insists, kicking him squarely in the shin only to elicit a low, ferocious snarl and an even darker glare before he vanishes altogether.

“Oi, no teleport – ” Her yell is interrupted as she whirls around because of course he’s already there, his hands grasping and yanking the bottles from her hands before she can react and hurling them across the room. The plastic shatters against the opposite curved wall and she hears the water splash and trickle onto the grating, it’s how hard he’s thrown them. She definitely didn’t plan well enough for this teleporting thing. She reaches into her overalls for another bottle but he’s faster, he’s against her in a flash, pulling a kitchen knife from the Doctor’s jacket and threatening to sever her carotid before her fingers grip either bottle.

“Oh, you bitch. You’re a hunter. Does the Doctor know what you used to get up to? Eh, does he?” She tries to keep her breathing steady, for fear a deep breath will mean a shallow slice into her neck, and struggles to stamp down her terror to think clearly and try to understand what he’s asking. Tries to erase from her short-term memory the sound of the Doctor's voice using such a term to address her.

“What d’you mean, hunter?” It comes out a squeak, unable to keep her voice firm and steady with the onslaught of flight instincts coursing through her.

“Don’t fuck with me!” The edge of the blade sinks into her skin, just slightly, barely a thin layer, but still she feels the wet heat trickling down her neck, a few drops collecting where her skin disappears beneath her shirt, and she freezes. Panics. Doesn’t say anything more.

“I’m gonna give you thirty seconds to make a convincing case for your life, ‘cause I’m feeling a bit generous,” he growls, twisted excitement in his features.

“Y’cant fly this thing,” she chokes out through shaky breaths, clenching her jaw to keep her teeth from chattering. He eases the blade away from her throat, intrigued by the cause and nothing more, if she had to guess. Putting all her effort into a steady voice, she continues. “Not without the Doctor. He’s the only one who knows how. Not even me. You’ve got to let the Doctor take control again, he can get you where you want to go.”

“This is not a convincing case.” He shakes his head with sinister laughter.

“Only if you keep me alive.” She delivers the clincher with more strength than the rest; hopeful he’ll take the bait. “If the Doctor wakes up an’ realizes I’m gone, he’ll do nothin’ for you. He’ll be tortured, die the rest of his regenerations out, before he helps you after that.”

“Is that so?” He wants desperately to seem skeptical but she can see through him: he’s contemplating, maybe even leaning towards believing her.

“Yes.” She nods, swallows. Such is her confidence in the Doctor’s will to keep her safe, his protective and yet vengeful nature, that she’s willing to wager her life on it against this nightmare from hell. Something the Doctor’s never encountered before, never defeated before. But surely his kind can’t possibly be worse than the Daleks?

“So, c’mon then, tell me what it is you want then let ‘im go. I’ll tell ‘im.” His black eyes narrow, he chews on the Doctor’s cheek as he runs the back of the blade along the skin of her throat, hesitant to give up whatever thrill he’s getting out of threatening her with it. She doesn’t whimper, doesn’t beg or repeat herself, having gauged him as the kind who doesn’t respond well to pitiful pleas for mercy. She meets him in the eyes whenever he dares to look at them, and though their depths of bleeding black ink send ice through her veins, she doesn’t let her terror show. Of losing the Doctor for good, of being killed, or worse. And eventually he caves.

“2006. May. For starter’s. I was meeting someone important before I was so rudely sent back to the 19th century. But trust me, blondie, this is only the first trip of many.”

She fights to stop her gasp that he's from her time, or hardly far removed from it.

“’Kay,” she agrees with a curt nod, under the pretense they’re going to submit and follow his orders so easily. “Where?”

“Earth. Doesn’t matter beyond that. I can travel, just can’t _time_ travel.” A deep breath whooshes into her lungs as he finally backs away, relief and adrenaline making her fight to recover the lack of oxygen. With a violent hurl of his shoulder he plunges the knife into the nearest TARDIS coral, drawing out an echoing metallic groan from the TARDIS; she winces, not entirely sure whether she can feel things like this, but doesn’t stop him. He drives the blade deep into the flesh of the organic stuff with his superhuman strength, twisting and wedging the blade to punctuated jerks and roars from the ship.

“Don’t want anyone getting hurt, now, would we?” He turns to Rose in his attempt to rationalize his attack on the ship, making it clear with his glare that no one’s to touch the knife until he regains control.

“Doctor,” he calls, and she realizes he’s not addressing her this time, but the man trapped inside, who can’t respond. “No getting distracted. Try anything funny and you’ll live to regret it. Follow my instructions or you can watch your own hands take the life of Miss Tyler here.” It’s like the words are nothing out of the ordinary to him, like he’s a physician giving a patient a diagnosis of the common cold and prescribing bed rest and fluids, relying on purely content to intimidate rather than tone as the threatening commands flow from his lips.

“Yes, well, farewell for now, Rose.” With a quick bow that make her sick from the obvious enjoyment he’s getting out of his performance, he’s gone.

The Doctor’s brown eyes and gasping breaths greet her as he falls to the grating again, but he doesn’t linger, instead pushing off the ground with feet and hands, stumbling twice before running to her, where’s she’s frozen to the spot, waiting for a sure signal it’s really him, that she can relax her clenched muscles.

“Rose.” Her name’s gravelly on his tongue and he takes a moment to catch his breath as he comes to a stop a couple feet in front of her, holding up his hands in a peacemaking gesture, his eyes full of guilt and sorrow as they gaze into her own, but the sound of it’s right. The demon just said it only moments ago but he can’t get the sounds right, the respect and adoration that ooze from the Doctor when he says her name, but she hears it now. His gaze drifts down to her neck and he grimaces, anger warring with sadness as his bottom lip quivers almost imperceptibly before his eyes snap back up to hers, a question in their depths she hears before he can say it.

“May I?” His hands linger in a state of indecision, torn between trying to soothe her and waiting for her permission, fidgeting for an extended moment with his collar and the air between them. She wants to say no. Her heart’s still racing with the recent brush with death, it’s the Doctor’s voice that lingers in her ears threatening her life (though tainted with an accent that’s not his), his hands that inflicted the throbbing in her neck and aching in her wrists. But it’s too much for her to bear, the terror in his eyes, the sheen of sweat that’s never there, the guilt in the set of his jaw. The bit of pink left in his cheeks and red on his lips from the fiery pain she severely hopes he didn’t have to feel.

She just barely nods, hesitant, stymied by the sting in her neck, and meets his eyes. Holds his gaze as he approaches, on edge for them to be swallowed in black again and renew the danger, though his short footsteps strive for non-threatening and his movements are slow, controlled. She still flinches as his hands land on her shoulders, closing her eyes and biting her lip to prevent from whimpering.

“Rose, it’s alright.” It’s a whisper and she’s glad she can’t see his face. “It’s me.”

“That’s what _he_ said.” She doesn’t mean to do it, to twist the knife, it just happens. It isn’t his fault, she’s just scared and running on adrenaline and still prepared to fight for her life, really she doesn’t mean it. But he still agrees through gritted teeth and tight lips.

“I know.” His hands fall from her.

A rustle of fabric, unclasping buttons, and a sudden ripping noise make her jump, her eyes flying open expecting another threat from his dark alter ego.

“I’m just tearing my shirt.” It’s still the Doctor, and he finishes the task of tearing off about a foot of the fabric from the bottom of his Henley, proving his point.

“Still bleeding.” He folds the shred of his shirt and brings it to her neck, reassurance in his eyes, the gentlest of pressure from his fingers as he holds it against the fresh cut, the other hand on her shoulder to help keep her balance.

“Want to hold it?” She obliges as soon as he asks, her fingers covering his over the makeshift gauze too suddenly, and she winces at the dose of pressure it brings. He pretends not to be offended as he lets go of the cloth but she knows he is; there’s nothing the Doctor loves more than to care for her, protect her, tend to wounds and make sure she’s in excellent health, fighting condition. To be needed, relied on.

“Oh, Rose, I’m so sorry.” His voice breaks with his spirit, realizing he’s lost so much of the trust it took them so long to build together in such a short amount of time.

The last three words fall from his lips in a continuous prayer as he searches for more evidence he’s hurt her, a whisper that quiets each time it’s repeated, until she can’t hear it at all. Just his lips moving, no sound entering her ears as he lifts her arms with delicate hands, caresses his thumbs over the light blues and purples coloring her wrists like they’re made of cracked glass. Lifting each of them gently in turn, he presses his lips to her bruised skin. There’s a drop of hot moisture on her knuckle on the second finger, but she doesn’t see it fall, too concerned with watching his hands, and he’ll never admit it was his.

“We’ve got to go. Don’t want him to think I’m wasting time.” His less than casual sniffing and unusual thick trembling in his voice confirm her earlier theory. He shakes it off, though, coming up to man the controls.

“2006.” He stares at the monitor, mind racing at a million miles a minute and she wonders if the demon can read his thoughts, too, or if the Doctor’s mind is too strong. When he speaks again something in his voice is confident, unafraid, despite their situation and the vulnerability he just revealed to her. “17th of May. Earth.” Moving with more speed than usual, he pulls levers and twists dials and mashes buttons and it takes her much too long to realize he’s trying to throw him off: the demon who’s watching his every move. Doesn’t want him to comprehend, much less memorize the steps it takes to get the TARDIS into the vortex and out of it someplace else effectively and safely.

“Rose.” He turns to her before throwing the final switch, gazing with a burning intensity like there’s something he’s trying to communicate telepathically, like there’s something she needs to understand. His mouth opens and closes a few times before he settles on saying, “You are worth fighting for.” Engaging the final lever with a flick of his wrist and a subtle but unmistakable wink, he sends them on their way: the return of the engines groaning, characteristic quakes and bumps telling her they’ve already left Scotland behind.

“Don’t say goodbye to me. Don’t you dare.” She points a finger at him even as the ground lurches beneath her feet and she falls onto the nearest coral for support. Steadying himself on the jumpseat, he shakes his head, firm and resolute.

A million questions flit through her mind that she can’t ask, not with the uninvited audience they have, even if he is taking the backseat in the Doctor’s body for now. Are they actually going to May 2006, Earth? If so, what are they going to do when they get there? What if the demon goes running off with the Doctor’s body, and she never sees him again? And if not, what will his reaction be – kill her? Take them both to some higher authority of hell? The mere thought of what’s waiting for them both when they land has her stomach in knots, and that’s not to mention the cryptic clue the Doctor’s just given her and seems to place so much weight on her grasping. Deciding it’s probably a higher priority to decipher that than worry about a fate she has no control over, she pulls the words to the forefront of her mind, repeating them in a litany.

_You are worth fighting for._

It does ring a bell. If not a farewell, then what? Words of encouragement? Unlikely. Is it code for something? Have they ever even talked about a code? She doesn’t remember it. Silently, she nudges the TARDIS for a hint, but she’s just as silent, either too queasy to respond or just as lacking in ideas as Rose herself.

The journey’s almost over, the bumps evening out, engines slowing their groaning when the reason for the phrase’s familiarity hits her, and just as the TARDIS reaches its destination with a final rumble and bang, there’s finally a shred of hope yet.

“Ah, hello again, Rose.” The Doctor’s gone Scottish again and her stomach drops as he abruptly abandons the charade of politeness. “How do I know he’s taken us where I asked?” he barks.

“I dunno, why don’t you go out an’ see.” She surprises herself with her sass and he scowls even deeper than usual, brow furrowing above his black eyes.

“I should be already,” he grounds out, looking bitterly around the console like he never wants to see any of its scenery again. “It’s not bloody working…” In his fleeting moment of distraction, she pulls two more of the bottles stashed inside her clothes, spraying him again before he can retreat.

A handful of loud bangs on the door startle her just as he starts shrieking in pain. _Awfully rare they have visitors,_ she smiles to herself. Waiting a few more seconds for him to plead with her to stop through a string of profanities, she dashes to the door as fast as her feet can carry her, using her weight to let the doors burst open in front of her, knowing who will be on the other side.

The door collides with the man on the other side, sending the blue-trenchcoated figure reeling from the impact against his face. He shakes it off, though, as she stands there holding the door hoping she isn’t about to get knifed in the back.

“Oh my god, Rose!” he exclaims, smiling ear to ear with arms open for a hug.

“Jack, I know, listen, something’s – ” She starts to explain, but when she pauses, glancing over her shoulder to find the possessed Doctor stomping down the ramp towards her, his weapon of choice in hand, she’s interrupted.

“Lookin’ good as always.” Still grinning like a fool as she turns to him and shoves him aside so she can flee from the doorway. He never did know the right time for a flirt.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it took me literally four months to update this... hope this doesn't disappoint!

“Woah, woah, woah, Doc, what’s goin’ on?” Jack holds out his hands, barricading the path to Rose with his body as the demon stumbles through the doorway of the TARDIS. He sees the knife too late.

“Holy sh – ”

His profanity is cut short as the Doctor’s arm swings in an uppercut for his stomach and Jack doubles over. From ten feet away and the backwards angle, it could almost have been a simple punch to the gut. But she knows the blade has sunk in by the garbled noise that comes from his mouth, and the sick, twisted grin tainting the Doctor’s mouth.

The demon pulls back and shoves the blue-coated figure to the side and he collapses to the ground with a strangled groan, a hand over the bloodstained clothes covering his abdomen. He remains sitting for a moment, choking on his own breaths and confused betrayal on his face as he stares up at the Doctor, but suddenly his eyes go wide as some unknown realization hits him just before he slumps onto his back and his head hits the pavement with a thud. Did the eyes give him away – does Jack know? Has he seen this before?

In the confines of her mind, Rose completely loses it: watching one of her best mates, and her truly last hope, live out the last few seconds of his life. Knowing no one else will ever even consider entertaining the idea that demons even exist.

The screams don’t come though, or the tears, just hyperventilation as she backs away from the demon, wielding the very dripping red blade he just used to murder her only chance of getting out of this alive.

Darkness cloaks wherever it is they’ve landed. She glances left, right and behind her to find a basically abandoned alleyway, no passersby in sight and the only light coming from a street at least fifty feet away. No one would have seen the crime, and given the silence of the vicinity no one would hear her scream in time, anyway. She just about resigns herself to her intimate, gruesome fate when a gunshot sounds. In the light of the nearest street lamp she can see Jack’s outstretched arm and the firearm clutched in his hand, and hear the demon cry out and hiss in pain at what must be a bullet lodged someplace in the Doctor’s back.

“Jack, the Doctor’s still – ” But she realizes it doesn’t matter.

The demon vanishes soundlessly, along with the Doctor’s body.

She scrambles over to Jack, wincing as her knees scrape against the cement through her thin tights as she skids to a stop over his lifeless form.

His eyes are closed, his jaw slack and the gun-wielding arm limp against the pavement. One touch of her fingertips to his neck confirms he used his last burst of energy to fire the shot.

She clamps her fingers over her mouth to stop from making any more noise than the gunshot already has, hot tears falling over the back of her hand before she can stop them. Heaving in a ragged breath through the small space provided by her hand, she tries to calm herself, to think of the positives. But she can’t find any.

An invisible hand closes around her ribs, crushing her spirit and any hope she had left like an empty aluminum can as she leans over the deceased man, tears soaking into his coat. His untimely demise was entirely her fault. She shouldn’t have left him vulnerable like that.

The demon has run off who knows where, doing who knows what, and is taking the Doctor’s body along for the ride. Likely never to return. He could be injured, or killed, or abandoned someplace. Maybe suffer a fate even worse than she can imagine. She shudders, burrowing closer in the bulky coat, not caring about the blood soaking into her own clothes.

A long, harsh gasp rips from the lungs just underneath her. With a high-pitched scream she leaps off his body, her scramble away becoming more of a sideways topple as the formerly lifeless arms bend at the elbows to lift him off the ground.

He continues to gasp for air as she stands and backs away, her chest constricting in pain with how fast her heart is crashing against it. Sobs she hardly recognizes as her own rip through the air as her control over her lungs slips.

“Rose,” he rasps out as he scans around himself and sees her.

“WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU!” she yells with more volume than she thought herself capable of, her vision tunneling as even this new reality crumbles around her.

“Rose, it’s me!” Jack rises to his feet, albeit slowly and with a loud groan of discomfort, holding his hands up in a peaceful gesture.

“You were dead!” she spits out, her teeth chattering with rage or terror, she isn’t sure. “What, are you a demon, too!?”

“Rose, no!! I can’t die! You did something to me, Rose. Back on Satellite Five. I’ve died a thousand times already, maybe more.” He rushes through his explanation in a husky voice, wheezing for breath every few words. “I’ve been waiting for the Doctor for so long, just hoping you’d still be with him. Rose, what the hell happened to him?”

Rose is still consumed with disbelief, worrying that something else supernatural threatens her despite Jack’s claim it is only the ethereal magic of the time vortex. But she needs someone to trust and rely on so badly, and has seen so many things that contradict logic and biology in the last few days, she thinks it might be better to take a chance at believing him than to flee into the unknown with no one at her side.

“Is it really you?” She takes a hesitant step forward, staring into his eyes, waiting for them to be swallowed in black or red or some other sinister color.

“Yes.” He doesn’t match her step forward, cautious of frightening her further. She wants so badly to believe him she almost does without another doubt, but then she remembers how the Doctor had tipped her off about this fateful meeting.

“What was the last thing you said to me, before we parted ways on Satellite Five?” Her voice never falters as she stares him down, muscles in her thighs twitching to bolt if he doesn’t get this right.

He looks confused at first, deep lines creasing his forehead as he meets her gaze, but his eyes are softer than her own, as of yet harboring no ill will. His gaze drops down as his brow furrows a bit more, crossing his arms and stroking his fingers along his chin as in deep thought.

“You were worth fighting for.” He recites the farewell verbatim without hesitation. “And then I kissed you.” A warm grin spreads across his cheeks, his gaze going distant as he recalls the memory. “The Doctor, too. But I have to say, yours was much more natural. I enjoyed that kiss a lot more.” He laughs at that.

“Oh my God, Jack,” she sobs, closing the distance between them at a full sprint and slamming into his chest. His arms close around her and she buries her face in his shirt and her fists in his thick coat, not caring if she gets residual blood on her clothes.

“The Doctor… he’s… hurt me… possessed… demon.” What words that do manage to escape her throat are garbled through her tears and shaky breathing.

“Shh… hey, it’ll be all right, Rose.” His hands smooth up and down her back as he sways them back and forth, cradling her against his chest. “I got you.”

He just holds her like that for a few minutes, shushing away her tears with soft words of hope and strong arms protecting her from the world behind her.

“Can you get us back inside the TARDIS?” His voice startles her back into the moment before she can succumb completely to the warring relief and hopelessness in her mind. “We should get off the street. It’s not exactly safe around here.”

“Yeah,” she mutters as they extricate themselves from the embrace, wiping the still-falling tears from her cheeks with some difficulty with the short sleeves of her shirt.

He keeps an arm around her waist as she reaches for her key and unlocks the door to allow them inside.

“Okay, listen,” he begins as soon as the door closes behind them and they’re safely tucked inside. “Let’s get you cleaned up, and then you can tell me everything, all right?”

“But – ” She starts to protest, knowing the Doctor could have as little as minutes left of his life, with the occupant of his body gallivanting about, bending him to its will.

“Nah-ah, trust me. You’re exhausted, not to mention covered in blood. A nice, hot shower will do you good. You won’t be able to think straight if you don’t calm down first.” He’s right, of course. Beneath the trauma and panic keeping her alert, she is far beyond exhausted. Deep down, a part of her simply wants to collapse right here on the grating and give up.

“Fine, just… will you come with me?” She just doesn’t want to be alone, and doesn’t realize how it might sound like she’s inviting him in the shower with her. She’s impressed that the captain of innuendo doesn’t take advantage of her slip.

“Of course.” He nods with understanding and no trace of humor before gesturing to the hallway, allowing her to lead the way.

\---

The tainted, bloodstained clothes in the garbage and the familiar steamy jets of water pounding against her skin, Rose can finally scrub all the places the dark and possessed version of the Doctor had touched her. Despite how many times she washes away suds and hot water, though, the sharp memories of his unbidden touches send chills down her spine. The near-scalding water makes the shallow slice on her throat sting. She shivers, covering her chest tightly with her arms as she sits on the nearest coral ledge, but the way she tightens her arms against her body cause the bruises on her wrists to throb with every heartbeat.

“Rose, I’m here,” Jack calls from behind the bathroom door, which she left ajar.

He’d promised to come straight to her room once he was done in the guest en suite, and she’s thankful he finished showering first. The familiar warmth in his voice brings her to her feet, gives her enough strength to grab the bottle of shampoo from the ledge.

“’Kay,” she calls back, her voice cracking.

She tries not to think of black eyes and dripping red knives and the hands she trusts most in the universe betraying and bruising her. But they creep into her thoughts regardless as she rinses her hair, making her wince in pain at the relived memories. Even with Jack, the situation is hopeless. She can’t help but feel responsible for the Doctor’s fate. If she could only have kept a better eye on him in Scotland, maybe he would never have been possessed, this would never have happened. If she hadn’t let the demon out of the TARDIS without a plan to get him back, maybe the Doctor wouldn’t be lost to her indefinitely.

Desolation racks her body as she realized she might never see his chocolate eyes and matching pinstripes again. Why should the demon bring the Doctor back to her? Because he knows she loves him? If anything, she thinks, he’ll use that as all the more reason not to return the Doctor home.

Her legs and arms begin to shake. The TARDIS will hardly be a home without its pilot. Last of the Time Lords. The man she loves more than anyone.

She shuts off the water as the hot throbbing behind her eyes and pounding under her skull worsens with the downward spiral of her thoughts, desperate to return to the reassurance of Jack’s company.

She dries off too fast and leaves her skin a little red, rubs a towel through her hair and throws on the jeans and sweater she’d picked out. Knowing she won’t be heeding to Jack’s advice to sleep anytime soon, she adamantly refuses to put on a pair of jim-jams. She can’t fall asleep now, she has to help Jack come up with a plan. She’s got to be strong, be proactive in this. She’s got to.

“Hey,” he greets her softly from the chair on the other side of her bed when she emerges from the loo, a thick could of steam billowing through the doorway with her. The TARDIS has outfitted him in a pair of black trousers and a pastel blue Oxford that he’s only buttoned two-thirds of the way up. His hair is still wet and the crisp, pine-like smell of whatever body wash he used reaches her from across the room. The same piercing blue eyes she remembers. He’s handsome as ever, though he claims to have died several hundred times.

“Feeling better?” he asks.

“Guess so.” She shrugs.

A fleeting moment passes that she entertains his undeniable aesthetic appeal before her thoughts catch up with her again. She turns her gaze to the carpet as she crosses the room to sit on the side of the bed closest to him. She realizes he looks a bit funny, this brawny yet well-dressed bloke in her hot pink fold-up chair, but it’s not enough to make her crack a smile.

“Okay.” He scoots the chair closer and leans forward with his knees on his elbows, hands clasped under his chin, giving her his undivided attention. He waits until she settles into the duvet, pulls a blanket up to her chin, and stops squirming to get comfortable to continue. “Tell me everything.”

\---

“So we don’t know where he went.” Jack had been more or less silent through her wordy and often tearful account of the last twenty-four or so hours, only stopping her to ask questions every now and then, some for clarification and some only rhetorical exclamations of disbelief. She hadn’t expected this to be his first coherent thought.

“That all you got from all that?” she snaps, anger breaking free of the dam inside her head. “Nice work, Captain Obvious.”

“But,” he continues more loudly, ignoring her spiteful comment. “We do know he’ll be back. And probably soon.”

“How do we know that?” She doesn’t know that. Hasn’t known that. If she had, she certainly wouldn’t have spent every second since seeing the Doctor worried sick she’d never see him again.

“Because, the Doctor was true to his word. We’re in the year 2006! And it’s even May! And if I remember correctly, you said that this was the _first_ place this Peter wanted to go. Not the last. Seems to me like whenever he’s finished with whatever business he came here for, he’s going to end up back here, threatening the Doctor to take him someplace else. Or I guess, some _time_ else.”

Rose covers her face in her hands and rubs her fingers over her eyes, hot tears collecting out of the sheer mental overload at the possibility. He’s right. Their chances are more than good that Peter (she figures if Jack is brave enough to use his name, she can, too) will come back here with a new demand for the Doctor, now that he’s not only confirmed he can travel in time, but that the Doctor is true to his word.

“Well, even so, what are we gonna do if he comes back? We have nothing to fight him with. No leverage against him. There’s no way he’ll just… leave and give us the Doctor back.”

“You’re right. We don’t have leverage. And we don’t have a way to fight him. But I know a couple of guys that do.”

“You do?”

“Yep. Met ‘em on a trip to the States to investigate a possible threat a couple years ago, when I first started rebuilding Torchwood. We suspected a bloodsucking avian from a few galaxies away, but it turned out to be something terrestrial, after all.” He pauses, checking her features for signs she can handle whatever he’s about to say, and takes a deep breath. “They were vampires, Rose. Feeding on the locals in East Texas.”

“Oh, God,” she groans, doubling over on the bed, clutching her stomach with one arm and holding her forehead up with the opposite hand. “Jack, why’s this happenin’? All these… things, these… demons and werewolves and monsters, they’re not supposed to be real.”

“Believe me, I know. Aliens are enough to deal with, if you ask me. But Rose, trust me, these guys can help. They’re experts at this kind of stuff. If anyone can beat this thing, they can.”

“But, they’re in America, yeah? How’s that gonna work?” She might not know what their exact cross streets are, but Jack had mentioned they were in a dingy part of Cardiff before they hopped in their respective showers.

“Just hold tight.” He rises from the chair and pulls his cell phone from the pocket of his trousers, tapping noisily through several contacts before finding the one he wants and bringing the device to his ear.

He shuffles around her bed as the line rings, glancing absently around her room like he’s trying to see if anything’s changed since he last saw it. While staring anxiously as his pacing form, she realizes he’s barefoot, and the thought is strangely comforting. She’s just about to give up hope that one of these blokes is going to answer the phone when Jack suddenly calls out a man’s name.

“Dean?”


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should probably just stop apologizing for every chapter coming 4 months after the last. It seems to be a trend that will stick, I'm afraid... but I have a hard time stopping that so... I'm very sorry it's been so long! I sort of just completely lost track of where I wanted to take this so it took me a while to write even when I finally sat down to work on it. I really hope you guys like the various directions I went with, and some of the bolder liberties I took... just in case this will severely bother anyone (I hope not), Dean is without question bisexual in this story. I always knew I wanted that to be the case, and I finally figured out how to do it actually sort of at the last minute while writing this chapter. I'm hoping everyone's on board with it cause I actually quite like it... *fingers crossed* but also p.s. if you don't - keep it to yourself b/c i won't stop liking it :D
> 
> WARNING: fairly intense **non-con** situations.

Rose jumps at the sound of the back door opening. She’d lost track of time as they sat at the curb, staring at the dashboard and trying to calm herself to the purring idle of the oversized engine. She looks back as two men clamber into the car with no pretense of grace, sloppily piling several bags into the vehicle with them. Immediately intimidated by the brown leather jacket, furrowed brow, and rugged, handsome features of one who sits first, she glances back out the window, just in time to see Jack finally yielding to a persistent copper who’d been waving at them to move since they arrived. The grunting and rustling continues from the backseat as she watches cabbies, pedestrians, and terminals blur morph into blurred lines.

“Boys, glad you made it okay,” Jack announces as he navigates away from arrivals, nodding at them through the rear view mirror.

“I hate flying,” a brusque voice from the backseat complains.

“Good to see you, too, Dean,” Jack teases again, flashing a devious smile.

Rose twists in her seat to look back again, only to find a mixture of terror and anger in the bright green eyes of the young man in the seat diagonal from her.

It’s oddly unsettling, to hear him complain about something so mundane when he’s supposed to be an expert at fighting the supernatural and therefore, allegedly, one of the only two men alive who can save the Doctor.

“I hate leaving all our guns behind,” he adds, raising his voice like it’s their fault, rather than laws of international air travel.

But then, his glare isn’t directed at her. It’s clearly for Jack, who he’s eyeing murderously through the mirror.

“Cool it, Dean,” the other bloke intervenes and she twists her body further around to get a good look at him for the first time.

Okay, then. Vivid green eyes and cropped light brown hair: Dean. The taller one, who looks a bit hunched over even in the roomy cabin of the Range Rover, longer, darker brown hair and much less threatening hazel eyes: Sam.

“Hi.” Sam reaches out his hand for hers with a friendly, reassuring smile, and she takes it awkwardly, trying to reach around the armrest and maneuver under the seatbelt. “I’m Sam, this is my brother, Dean.” He nods his head in his brother’s direction.

Dean reaches out his hand, too, with a nod and a smile that’s tainted around the edges, like he’s trying too hard for exuberance. It quickly fades as his hand returns to his knee.

“’M Rose,” she says shyly.

“So, you got a demon problem, huh?” Dean does a poor job of hiding his distrust of strangers.

Rose tenses, but knows she’d better answer him, not wanting to show vulnerability to anyone this rough around the edges.

“Yeah. ‘S my best mate,” she hedges, not wanting to reveal just how arse over elbow she is for the Doctor – it’s not a necessary detail for their job. “Tried t’kill me, an’ Jack, too.”

“How did you know it was a demon, Rose?” Sam asks, huddling forward as much as the seatbelt will allow (he’s dutifully wearing in the correct position, quite unlike Dean who hasn’t touched his once).

“He told me ‘imself.” She shrugs. How else would she have known?

“What did he say his name was?” Dean asks, dipping down to an even lower octave.

“Peter.”

Sam and Dean share a look of confusion, neither of them appearing to recognize the name, and then Sam hums in contemplation, resting his head on a few long fingers.

“Hmm. Not someone we’ve encountered before. But Jack was definitely right to call us, demons just started cropping up on us not too long ago,” he explains, still as calm as though explaining the weather forecast. “Did it seem like he was alone?”

“Seemed like it, yeah,” she affirms. “Said he had some business to attend to in different… places. Asked us to take him to…” she checks herself, deciding to tell the blokes about time travel on a strictly as-needed basis. “Someplace, and said he’d be back.”

“What the hell does he want with you?” Dean doesn’t mean to say it with the harsh condescension he does, Rose is certain. All they really know is she has a friend with a technologically advanced mobile home, so it makes sense for them both to be confused why a demon would personally track them down just to bum a ride. She remembers what Peter said before… _I can travel, I just can’t_ time _travel…_ and thinks they must be even more baffled.

“Uhm…” She looks to Jack, silently asking whether it’s safe to tell these Americans the truth. With the slightest nod, he gives her the green light, but she still isn’t sure she even wants to tell them the truth, for fear they’ll think she’s completely barmy. Earlier, Jack had insisted she do most of the talking, but she never thought he’d be this tight-lipped. Having some of his shameless, dirty humor would probably lighten up the mood in the vehicle.

Sam detects Rose’s discomfort and steps in, thinking it’s because of Dean’s insensitivity.

“Your friend, who is he?” he asks, like the answer is the most interesting thing he’ll hear today.

“The Doctor.”

“He’s a doctor, okay.” Sam nods with raised eyebrows, impressed. “What’s his name?”

“The Doctor,” she repeats.

“What, his name’s the Doctor?” Dean holds up air quotes around his name, his tone derisive.

“Yeah,” she asserts, the first volatile sparks of anger igniting in her gut.

“You gotta be shitting me,” Dean mutters, failing to choke back his laughter. She crushes her teeth together to keep from hurling out an insult.

“That’s his real name?” Sam asks, polite and calm as ever, but she can’t quite tell if the concern in his eyes is for the Doctor or her mental health.

“Yes,” she snaps.

“Okay.” Sam holds up his hands, relinquishing authority to her, and shoots Dean an icy glare when he chortles again.

“Is there any reason he’d have a demon coming after him?” he continues, his voice soft again. “Did Peter say he was looking for anything the Doctor might have?”

“Well, yeah, actually…” Sam’s going to coax the truth right out of her if he keeps this up.

He leans forward in his chair, hands clasped in front of his knees, eyebrows low over his eyes, but Dean doesn’t seem nearly as interested in what she has to say. He slumps slightly in his chair, rolling his eyes at Sam’s unbridled interest.

“The Doctor’s got a time travel machine,” she rushes out in a short breath.

Sam’s eyebrows shoot up on his forehead, but otherwise he doesn’t move or speak.

“He can time travel? Like Doc??” Dean pipes up again, searching Sam and Rose’s faces for validation of his own amusement, and on finding none, just shakes his head again and stares out the darkly tinted window, sarcastic laughter under his breath. Rose never could stand being the subject of any degree of ridicule.

“Oi!! ‘M not just some… nutter makin’ this up! An’ I don’t care who you are; I don’t appreciate me or the Doctor bein’ laughed at!” Most of her fury is directed at the thicker brother, but she forces eye contact with both, leaving no shred of doubt she won’t tolerate it from either. “He’s called the Doctor because he _helps_ people. Saves ‘em. So shut it. What, demons an’ vampires you can believe, but time travel is just too mad? Well you can sod off, mate,” she adds. The stress is really getting to her; normally it’d take much more to insult her like this.

“Rose,” Jack cautions, reaching for her arm.

“She’s right, Dean,” Sam interjects before Rose can continue to defend the Doctor. “It’s not exactly the weirdest thing we’ve ever heard of. And it makes sense, for this demon to go after him if he has something that valuable. Imagine how much more damage they could do if they could go back and change the past. All these demons coming after us… maybe they’re going to extremes trying to take us on, after what happened with Meg.”

Dean still looks quite skeptical, and the brothers carry out a silent conversation with their eyebrows and a chorus of throat clearing, grunting, and heavy exhaling through their nostrils.

“You two want to be alone?” she teases angrily, not at all appreciative of their cavalier attitudes towards the Doctor’s situation so far.

“You know what? Fine,” Dean concedes, palms in the air. “It doesn’t matter whether we believe this pile of crap about time travel. You got a demon and unfortunately we owe Jack Harkness a favor.” Dean says the sentence with such intense faux cheeriness it’s unsettling. “So tell us what happened.” He crosses his arms, sinks back into his chair and just waits for the story.

She spares a look at Jack, and he winks to let her know she’ll get that story from him later. She allows herself a moment to grin out the front window, because she honestly can’t wait to hear that one, but quickly erases it from her face so she can glare at Dean, suddenly unsure if she even wants his help at all. As of yet she’s seen no evidence they even have what it takes to tackle any of hell’s minions, let alone one that’s hijacked the body of one of the most intelligent and powerful aliens in the universe.

“Rose, we believe you.” She recoils when Sam’s hand lands on hers, pulling away from his reach, but softens at the compassion in his eyes. The dynamic of these two brothers confuses her. She wonders how they can ever accomplish anything if they’re always disagreeing like this. “We’ve definitely seen stranger things than time travel. And it’s true that we owe Jack a favor.” His eyes glance over to their driver, who’s pretending to be preoccupied with weaving dangerously through traffic. “But we want to help. I know it’s hard to believe, but this is what we do.”

Sam pulls a book from his bag, a crinkly, brown leather-bound notebook with a precarious binding and misaligned pages peeking out from the sides, and Dean conspicuously fidgets in his seat. Releasing the clasp, Sam turns it around and holds it out for her, opened to a page filled with scrawled handwriting and a large horned stick figure drawing, and several unrecognizable symbols with detailed explanations on the opposing page.

Taking caution not to further disrupt the integrity of the worn notebook pages, she takes it delicately in both hands and begins to flip through the creased pages. Crude ink drawings, newspaper clippings, and old photographs cram the lined pages, titled with names of monsters until a few days before she would never have believed existed. Symbols, spells, and techniques pack in the empty spaces between the images, leaving all but a millimeter of blank space around the edges of each page. Descriptions of various encounters and confrontations with the creatures, labeled with recent dates, make her close the book with a gasp.

Shoving it back into Sam’s waiting hands, she covers her mouth with her hand looks back to the two of them. There’s something in the boys’ eyes she didn’t see until now. The same thing she saw in her first Doctor’s eyes sometimes, the pain and trauma of seeing too much and losing loved ones buried beneath a constant façade of stoic toughness. Because they have to stay strong, to do the most good they can with the burden of knowledge and experience they have now. She can’t help but empathize, after what she’s seen the Doctor go through, and trusting them becomes automatic.

She starts over, going back to Scotland in the 1800s and telling them everything she knows about the demon called Peter.

\---

Getting the boys into the TARDIS actually goes as Rose expected. They both adamantly stand outside, insisting they won’t all fit inside and that they can make their plans from outside. Jack opens the door just enough that they can see the interior space, a ridiculous smirk on his face. Sam enters, exits, and circles the box several times, hypothesizing nonsense theories aloud to himself while Dean utters a string of profane sentences before simply standing in the doorway, gaping at the console and watching Sam do his rounds without saying or doing much else.

“How… what… ah…” Sam chokes out, running a hand back through his hair and staring wide-eyed at the glowing time rotor.

“What the fuck’s going on here?” Dean demands, finally revealing a bit of astonished fear she remembers from all those months before.

“How is this possible?” Sam asks, reaching out to stroke the nearest coral, as though to prove it’s solid.

“Look, I know what you’re feeling right now, I really do.” Rose tries to mollify them. The first time she stepped on board was nothing short of horrifying. “But I can try to explain that later. For now, can we just focus on the plan? He may be back at any moment an’…”

Her breathing gets out of hand again. Being back in the TARDIS isn’t the welcome home she imagined it would be. The normally soothing echo of the time rotor is haunted with whispers of a Scottish Doctor threatening her, the hallway leading to the rest of what has become her home only seems dark and foreboding, ready to swallow them all whole.

The TARDIS tiptoes into her mind with happy memories and encouraging thoughts to reassure her, but she still can’t help but shiver at being back in this room after what happened. She confirms that Peter hasn’t returned since they’ve been gone, and it’s a small relief, but it also means the Doctor is still at his mercy, lost to them both for the time being, and her heart sinks again.

“Okay, yeah. Sorry.” Sam shakes his head to clear away some of the initial shock, clearly putting immense effort to focusing on her rather than the impossibility of a telephone box that’s bigger on the inside. Dean, surprisingly, also lets it drop with only an exaggerated sigh, and follows his brother’s lead.

“Demons are actually pretty easy to trap.” Sam begins. “All we’ll need is a can of paint.”

\---

She and Jack set up camp in the library, arms full of enough portable food and water and sleeping supplies for them all to crash in it for the night, if need be, while the brothers got to work on painting what they called a “devil’s trap” on the wood floor of the Doctor’s room. They all agreed separating for the evening would be a bad idea.

“So, tell me,” Rose pleads as soon as the door is closed behind them.

“Well.” He raises his eyebrows cheekily as he drops two piles of stuff from his arms on the floor. “I told you about the vampires from Texas, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, it’s like I told you. I thought they might have been aliens, so I was already there. Not just in the town, but at the scene where it all went down. The boys got sloppy. Lost count of the coven. They told me to ‘get the fuck out of there’, but I don’t like taking orders, so I stuck around. Just stayed at a distance. Lucky for them, too. I ran in at the last second to chop off one of the vampire’s heads before it could sink its teeth into Dean’s neck.”

“Impressive.” She smiles widely as she gives the captain a high-five.

“That’s not the best part, though.” That smirk crops up again, the one from the car that he always seems to put on when he’s thinking something wildly inappropriate.

“Oh my God,” Rose breathes, guessing what he’s about to say.

“They both thanked me, after, and Sam apologized for underestimating me and invited me to come with them for a few drinks to celebrate. But Dean didn’t want that. He basically told me not to follow their car when they left.” They both start to arrange four distinct sleeping quarters on the floor with the blankets they’ve collected.

“Why d’you think he didn’t like you?” Rose asks.

“I had this feeling about Dean, from the start. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with a little innocent flirting, whether it’s with a man or woman or something in between.”

“Innocent?” Rose questions, tongue between her teeth. He shrugs with a small nod to say he acknowledges her point.

“Sam didn’t seem to mind it, but it was making Dean more and more uncomfortable. By the time he told me to back off, I was pretty sure I was dealing with a bisexual who really wished he was just straight. In other words, very deep in the closet. I wasn’t going to pressure him about it, so I was ready to leave. But Sam insisted I come along, and it didn’t take much more than a smack on Dean’s arm to convince him to let me _ride along_.”

“Jack!” Rose smacks him on his own arm.

“All right, all right!” He rubs the spot where her fist made contact and goes for the big container of salt he’d grabbed from the kitchen. “Anyway, later that night, Dean got a little drunk…” he trails off as he starts to pour a line of salt around the edges of their camp. Rose sits down on the one she’s picked out for herself, watching the white sand pour onto the wood, when it hits her.

“Oh my God, Jack, you didn’t…”

“We did.” Jack makes an obscene gesture with his hips, messing up the salt line. He curses a little at the blemish in the circle, but it doesn’t dampen his obvious joy.

“Jack, y’can’t… he was intoxicated, isn’t there like… a moral code against that or… something?”

“Oh, come on Rose,” he waves his non-salt-wielding hand to dismiss her argument. “He was begging for it. And he’s gorgeous. It was impossible to turn him down.”

Rose just sits there, gaping. No wonder Dean’s constantly angry with Jack: he could blow his ‘straight guy’ cover at any moment. Must be exhausting pretending that hard all the time and worrying your one night stand from years ago could open his gob and make it all for nothing.

“Wait, so, were you his first…???” Rose leaves the question unfinished, hoping he’ll discern her meaning.

“Time with a man? I’m almost certain.”

“I mean, did he…”

“He definitely seemed to enjoy it,” Jack finished her thought again, attempting to be nonchalant, but a blush flares on his cheeks and he’s looking smug as ever.

“So that’s why he’s so upset?”

“It must be. He was angry at himself in the morning, but he took it out on me. Threw a lamp at my head.”

“Did Sam know?”

“He sort of had to, when Dean stumbled into my hotel room instead of his that night. But Sam really doesn’t care. Honestly couldn’t care less. It still made him angry, Dean being irresponsible and getting pissed and sleeping with a stranger. But no more angry than if he’d been with a woman.”

“So, what happened, then? How’d you three leave it?”

Jack finishes up the large circle of salt around their makeshift beds and starts walking around to check for thin spots.

“Dean couldn’t even look at me. He took off in their classic Chevy gone who knows where. Sam gave me the stink eye while I explained what happened – not graphically!” he adds when Rose stands up and moves to punch him again. “But he basically thanked me for saving his life and gave me a number to call if I was ever in trouble with anything supernatural again. In the end though, he told me he wanted me gone by the time Dean got back. That he’d need some time to come to terms with it.”

“Guess he never did,” Rose mused.

“Guess not.”

“’M still glad they came. That they’re gonna help us.”

“Me too. I was a little worried it would be too much for him. I know he seems rude and tough, but he really is a decent guy, deep down. He just doesn’t like to show it.”

“This coming from a man who shagged ‘im once while he was plastered?”

“He wasn’t _that_ plastered,” Jack defends his integrity. “He didn’t throw up on me or anything. Just drunk enough to turn off that annoying straight guy telling him not to bang the hot stranger that saved his life.”

“Oh my God…” Rose rests her forehead in her hands, shaking her head.

“You better go and check on ‘em,” Jack suggests, derailing her thoughts. “Make sure they don’t get lost in the winding hallways.”

Deciding he’s right, she gets to her feet, stepping carefully over the salt line and giving Jack one last good shove on her way out, for good measure.

“Whatever you do, don’t tell him I told you. I think he’d murder me.”

“I’m _positive_ he would,” Rose jokes.

\---

Sam and Dean are needlessly impressed that Rose was able to make a batch of holy water on her own, but they are well-stocked with canteens of the stuff already. Jack had plenty of guns in the back of the Range Rover, and the boys are loading them up with large chunks of rock salt as they talk through a plan (she still isn’t convinced these or the silly salt ring will do any good; she’ll have to see them in action).

“Are you sure those salt bullets won’t hurt ‘im?” Rose asks tentatively as Dean loads the last couple of chunks into a shotgun.

“He’ll be fine,” Dean insists, no room for question in his gruff voice.

“We hope we won’t have to use them,” adds Sam.

“Sam, come on, be realistic. The chances of that meat suit still being alive after –”

“Dean!” Sam commands him to stop, sternly. “Rose, don’t listen to him. We’ve saved plenty of people from demon possessions while they were still alive.” He gives her a hopeful look before glaring daggers over at Dean, and she isn’t sure if he’s telling the truth or just desperately trying to reassure her.

Sitting next to her on the bed, he sets one of his (very large) hands on her shoulder with delicate pressure. It still feels terribly inappropriate, even ominous, having even more strangers on board, and in the Doctor’s room, no less, one of the most private places on the whole ship. She’d only been in here for the first time a few weeks before, when in the midst of the “new, new Doctor’s” elaborate plan to get her to trust him again, he showed her some of these more intimate locations in a gesture of openness.

“Rose, are you sure you want to do this?” Sam pulls her from her somber recollections.

“Yeah,” she mumbles, knowing she _needs_ to stay strong and do this, if she ever wants to see the Doctor without glassy charcoal eyes again.

“ _Anything_ goes wrong, and you yell for us, got it?” Despite Dean’s aversion to the ship, and Jack, and even the Doctor himself, he’s shown himself more and more to be quite concerned for her personal safety.

“We won’t let you get hurt again,” Sam adds, glancing down to the bruises on her arms.

He hops off the bed to help Dean slide the Doctor’s rug over the freshly painted, circular symbol on the wooden flooring. The pointed edges of the star and the strange, disconnected symbols in the panels distinguish it from the Doctor’s native language, but she finds it bitterly ironic, nonetheless. The whole situation feels disrespectful to him, blasphemous even; the giant circle on the floor simply adds to a growing stack.

The room still smells of fresh spray paint, so she silently asks the TARDIS to purge the aromatic vapors from the room, erase the evidence.

“You said the ship can hide us?” Sam asks, at least pretending the idea isn’t out of the ordinary. “Normally demons are able to sense us. I’m still not sure how, if it’s smell or hearing or some other sense we don’t even have.”

“Yeah. Trust me. She hid me from ‘im before. Otherwise I’m sure I’d be dead.”

“She?” Dean asks, one eyebrow raised condescendingly.

“Yeah, ‘s that so weird?”

“No,” Sam insists, talking over his brother before he can finish another word.

“I still don’t get it. How can a time machine be ‘alive’?” Dean holds up air quotes around the word. Neither of them still knows the truth: that she’s a giant, powerful, telepathic alien ship, rather than the DeLorean these boys clearly had in mind.

“’s… hard to explain. Just trust me on this, ‘kay?” she pleads, hoping they won’t press the issue further. The smile she tries for ends up as more of a grimace.

“Figures,” Dean mutters, but turns to gather their things from the floor.

The door to the Doctor’s room exits as close to the console room as the doors have ever been, and he picks up on it.

“Okay, I _know_ it took way longer than this to walk back here.” Dean is nearly to his breaking point with unanswered questions.

“I think you’ve always been a little unobservant, though, Dean-o,” Jack teases as he emerges from the door across the hall, changing the tension from one about the nature of the vessel back to Dean’s palpable sensitivity to Jack’s jabs.

“All right, enough, okay?” Dean’s voice could cut through steel, and his green eyes darkened by the dim lighting harshly admonish Jack for teasing him again. “Still think you put something in my drink that night.” He rolls his shoulders as he walks across the hall to the library door, shoving Jack aside with a rough hand on his shoulder. Jack thuds against the opposite wall at the same time the door swings open and crashes into the wall on the other side rather loudly. A groan from the TARDIS makes Dean curse from further within the library.

It’s strange that his sense of masculinity is so fragile. He does have something of a distinctly heterosexual bravado going on, but she doesn’t think him any less a man for who he decided to shag in the past. Even Jack.

\---

She waits in the library with them, as the hours slog by, perfecting and (embarrassingly) rehearsing their plan to trap Peter and rescue the Doctor. The brothers and Jack all fix up a meal of sandwiches, but she doesn’t have the stomach to eat anything. Though she may be the one who needs the fuel the most, she knows she’ll be sick if she swallows anything down. Though, she might be sick either way. After all their brainstorming, she knows their scheme is the only way to lure this thing into their trap without further harm coming to the Doctor, but the prospect of what she has to do when he returns makes her physically ill. She’d been uncertain whether she and the Doctor would be able to recover from this, even if she did save him somehow. But after this? He’ll never be able to look at her in the same way. Nor will she at him.

It’s going to change their relationship forever.

\---

It’s seventy-three minutes later that the TARDIS alerts her that the demon has returned, a silent but aggressive alarm. She hardly has the strength or bravery to speak as the image sharpens in her mind: the Doctor barging through the front doors with none of the respect and caution he normally does. His jacket is missing entirely, his blue Henley even more tattered than when he left, un-tucked from his trousers, dirtied with something brown. His hair is in chaotic disarray completely unlike the methodic madness (and product) with which he styles it normally. His jaw is set hard, the Doctor’s normally endearing dimples made sinister by the eyebrows set impossibly low over the black holes of eyes.

Rose swallows hard.

“I’ve got to go,” she whispers, grabbing for the door handle.

“You’re gonna be okay.”

“I’m sorry, Rose. Good luck out there.”

“Go get ‘im, Rose. We got your back.”

She can’t match the correct voices to the words; they just filter in one ear and out the other in a jumbled mess.

The TARDIS takes care of closing the door, soundlessly, as she leaves the comfort of the room and the men’s presence for the quiet desolation of the hall and the terror that awaits in the console. She sets her jaw, aiming to emulate that way the demon does it, if only to stop her teeth from chattering, as she steels her resolve to walk into the console room.

His back is turned, trying to manipulate the controls himself, though with markedly less aggression than he had used before he left, and that’s when she sees it. A small hole in the back of the Doctor’s shirt, a large circular stain of blood dried around it, just to the right of his right shoulder blade.

A bullet wound.

She’d completely forgotten about Jack’s shot.

But there’s really no time now to investigate whether the Doctor is in pain, or even alive, within the possessed exterior. And at any rate, the demon would never tell her if he was. Her only hope is to set him free and pray with ever fiber of her being that he can walk away from a gunshot wound alive. And, preferably, without regenerating.

“You’re back,” Rose calls to him, finding scraps of courage from deep within herself.

He wheels around on one foot, eyes roving over her body, searching for signs of more holy water or another weapon. She holds up her hands as an indicator of her non-hostility, and his stiff posture slackens a bit. He shoves his hands in his pockets, so much like the Doctor would that she shivers, hairs pricking up at the back of her neck, and only hopes he doesn’t notice.

“I need 1972. October 16th. Now.”

“Sure,” she agrees casually, shrugging her shoulders slightly. The demon unsurprisingly frowns and narrows his eyes, clearly in disbelief that she isn’t about to make his life more difficult.

“Thought you weren’t an easy woman,” he scoffs. As ridiculous as it would be given any other circumstances, Rose is grateful for the offhand comment about his earlier assault. Gives her a way in.

“I’ve been thinkin’ about that, actually.” She remembers how to do this, from her pre-Doctor days, but she doesn’t know if she still has what it takes, or if she’s become so rusty alongside someone who is (for all practical purposes) asexual, that he won’t buy into this at all.

“About what?” he spits back, undercurrents of his earlier fiery anger upon her refusal cresting the surface. He seems much more tense, edgy even, than before she arrived, and she feels strangely empowered that she can inspire anxiety in him, to any degree.

She approaches him slowly, mostly so she can keep an eye on his hands to ensure he doesn’t reach into the depths of the Doctor’s clothes and pull out that wretched bloodied knife again. Rather than answer his question directly, she tries a different avenue to jog his memory.

“What you said before. I’m not the one who doesn’t ‘put out.’” The words sound strange coming from her mouth. “’S him.”

“What?” Confusion creases the lines on his forehead even deeper.

She takes a deep breath as she walks the last few steps towards him.

“How good of a shag are you, Peter?” She does her very best to let the words roll off her tongue seductively, imagining on as many levels as she can that she’s just talking to the Doctor.

“I’m from hell, darling.” The last word slithers from his tongue in a way that could never be construed as a term of endearment. “We’re notoriously skilled in all sins of the flesh.” The syllables drip from his tongue one by one as he starts to salivate at what she’s offering, making no attempts at subtlety as he gazes down at her legs and chest again.

Suddenly, the black depths of his eyes shrink inward, revealing the whites and brown corneas of the Doctor’s eyes, leaving only the pupils black. Hope flutters in her stomach for a moment, but her Doctor isn’t the one who speaks next.

“Why do you ask?” the Scottish lilt continues.

Rose can’t decide if it’s worse to stare into the black eyes casting the Doctor’s face into shadow, or to stare into the Doctor’s proper eyes knowing that he isn’t the one in control. Is the change of eye color voluntary? Do they only turn black when the demon is angry?

But she doesn’t have the time to suss out the answers she needs. She has to stick with the plan, to not give him time to second-guess this.

“I’ve _always_ wanted the Doctor,” she purrs, trying to recall every move that ever worked on a bloke back in high school. She runs her fingertips along the front of his shirt from the open buttons down his sternum, pausing at the bottom before returning up the path with the backs of her fingernails.

“But he’s never wanted me,” she continues, letting the words flow out like honey in the quietest tone she can hear over her racing, thudding heartbeats.

“This might be my only chance, really.” Fluttering her eyelashes a bit, she reaches a hand up carefully to stroke his jawline, gently pressing the pad of her thumb into his cheek. She wishes so badly everything until now had been a nightmare, and this is just the Doctor, finally amenable to intimacy, and they’re about to naturally progress to a deeper relationship… but he doesn’t let her have even a small moment to indulge that fantasy.

“Are you saying you _changed your mind_?” he asks, brogue impossibly thick. He’s clearly still skeptical, but his eyes are alight as they were during their first encounter, the sadistic excitement of a snake at the sight of a plump young mouse. That hunger that startled her enough to warn her he wasn’t the Doctor the first time around.

But now she’s going willingly.

“I just… want this body so much,” she lies, still syrupy sweet and almost whining with faux desire. She hopes the truth inspiring the lie, that she wants the Doctor _back_ in this body so much, will show through just enough to persuade him she’s authentic. “Must’ve been mad to turn it down the first time.”

“You’re not going to bite me again, now, are you?” It’s low and rumbling and so laced with implicit threats that she can’t speak for a moment, just shakes her head, barely enough that he can acknowledge the movement.

“Bloody fucking hell, I can’t turn you down.” He closes the short distance between them and seals his lips over hers, an aggressive, sweltering hot kiss. She tries to return his enthusiasm, daydreaming again it’s only _his_ lips she’s kissing, but the dream is shattered within seconds because _he_ would never snog her like this. She always thought their first kiss would be soft and hesitant, that his hands would be cradling her face, rather than copping a feel.

Tears well up behind her eyelids so she shuts off that line of thought altogether, concentrates strictly on getting the Doctor back, on getting this thing out of him, chanting to herself over and over: _I’ll save you, Doctor. I’m sorry_. It becomes just a task, tolerating the dominant lips and bold tongue until he’s satisfied enough to take a breather, and somewhere in the back of her mind a darkly humorous part of her thinks she could have made a great call girl. If she’d never met the Doctor, maybe.

He growls when he pauses the first time, and she flinches in her skin but he doesn’t even seem to notice.

“What a little temptress you are,” he growls again, bringing a hand up to close around her breast. He rolls it beneath his palm too roughly as his mouth crashes back to hers, but she doesn’t squeal, just puts her arms around his neck and pretends to enjoy it, all of it. Makes contented little noises at timed increments for his benefit. Rocks her hips against his a couple of times. It’s easy. So, so terribly easy to fool him, she thinks. This must be one very, very randy demon. She puts to the back of her mind the fact that he tried to kill her, and _did_ kill Jack, technically… because right now, his mind is far from it. She’s fairly certain the other men walking armed into the room wouldn’t distract him from taking what he wants now.

Both his hands land on her arse and grip tightly, lifting her easily off the ground in one jerky movement while his teeth nip roughly at her neck, sparing no tenderness for the gash he inflicted. She has to seal her eyes closed to avoid crying out, turning her whimper into a small moan with tremendous effort.

He sets her on the jump seat, though, and she panics.

This isn’t part of the plan.

“Oh!” She struggles to stay in character. “Can we go to the Doctor’s room?” she pants.

“Forget it,” he barks, hands fumbling with the button on her jeans as his tongue dips into her cleavage.

“Ah, please, it’s… ah, it’s always been a fantasy of mine.” Please let this work, please let this work…

He looks up, hands pausing their current task, and she bites her lip, trying for the seductive rather than the nervous way.

“Is it close?” he breathes, gravelly.

“First door on the left.” She nods to the hallway.

“Fine.”

Before she can get one full proper breath he’s hoisted her back up in his arms and carried her to the hall. They’re at the door in no time at all, and he throws it open with one hand.

This is it. She just holds on for dear life, hoping it will be construed as an act of passion, closes her eyes, and waits.

But the next moment, she’s being tossed onto the bed, and he’s unzipping her. She whips her head to the right to check the path, and it’s just as she remembered it. The rug is directly in the path from the door to the bed. He must have walked deliberately around it.

He’s got her jeans completely off now, and it takes everything she’s got not to clamp her legs together.

“Y’know, when I said the Doctor’s room, I actually meant on the rug!” she blurts out, willing to say anything to prevent this from going further. She’d prepared herself for tongues and grabby hands but she didn’t sign up for this.

“What?” he snarls, stopping with his fingers hooked around her knickers.

“The rug,” she chokes out again. He glowers down at the floor. She squeezes her eyes shut, if only to make the Doctor’s contorted features and the spots in her vision go away.

“You want me to fuck you on the floor?” he grounds out.

“Yes… please,” she squeaks.

“What the hell are you playing at?” He’s yelling now, properly, and she opens her eyes as he stops touching her, only to watch Doctor’s eyes liquefy into solid black again. He marches to the corner of the bed, pulling at the further of two wooden bed posts and wrenching it from the frame within seconds, sending splinters raining to the floor. Stomping over to the rug, he lifts up one corner with the detached carved wood and heaves the rug up from its position on the floor. And she knows they’re done for. She sits up, ready to make a dash around him for the door, but he lunges for her.

“Jack!” she screams, as loud as her vocal cords can stand.

“Clever little cunt!” The knife somehow appears in his right hand; she knew he’d stashed it somewhere. She leaps off the side of the bed to dodge the initial strike, and runs for the Doctor’s en suite, hoping to barricade herself inside.

All three men burst into the room just as the demon’s arms wrap around her.

“Let her go, you son of a bitch!” She recognizes Dean’s voice.

He turns them around, holding the blade up to her neck until she can feel every individual ridge in its sharp surface, and every shaky breath shears a few layers of skin against it. The brothers both have their guns up to their chests, and Jack is clutching several bottles and the notebook from the car. Sam and Jack don’t dare to speak another word, and all three of them stand just as helpless as she is, no shots being fired or holy water being squirted.

None of them ever thought it would come to this. They have no plan for it.

The demon’s nightmarish brogue breaks the heavy silence.

“All three of you are going to let me walk out of this room _right now_ , or I’ll slit her fucking throat.”


End file.
